


The Matchmaking Misadventures of Enel, Supreme Ruler of All

by Fairy_Dragon



Category: One Piece
Genre: Comedy, Enel is (not) the best at this job, M/M, Other Ships Not Mentioned in Tags, Romance, but mostly for the sake of more comedy, not every pair will work out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-06
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:54:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21692605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fairy_Dragon/pseuds/Fairy_Dragon
Summary: What happens when a god grows bored with his own greatness? He seeks entertainment on the four Blues beneath him, of course. And once he has set his sights on any puny human, their sorry existence will soon be graced by his divine intervention.Some fools just have to be led to their luck by force.A story in which Enel decides that matchmaking would be a great thing to get a better reputation.
Relationships: Eustass Kid/Trafalgar D. Water Law, Fushichou Marco | Phoenix Marco/Portgas D. Ace, Mihawk/Zeff, Monkey D. Luffy/Trafalgar D. Water Law, Penguin/Shachi (One Piece)
Comments: 25
Kudos: 89





	1. Prolog

**Author's Note:**

> One Piece and all characters therein are owned by Eiichiro Oda.  
> I do not write for commercial purposes.  
> This story's basic plot idea was created by myself and calicomako.  
> I want to thank her for beta-reading this story and pointing out multiple helpful things to make it better and more easily readable.  
> I plan to write as many chapters as I have ideas and fun pairings for. I would guess the overall story is halfway finished by now and I should be able to upload once a week.  
> Have fun reading and always feel free to give feedback and point out mistakes :)  
> Please do not copy this work to other sites without my permission.

**Prolog: Enel**

The glorious Enel reclined in his throne on Fairy Vearth and watched his new underlings, the Automata, with a most unpleased look on his perfect face. There was nothing wrong with the place, really. He was just feeling a bit... _uneasy_ , to say the least. There was no way that a great god such as himself would be troubled by such a simple matter. Still, this one particular thing troubled his golden mind for quite a while now. 

****

“If you could wish for one thing, what would you like to obtain?” he suddenly asked one of the Automata busying itself with preparing the supreme one´s meal at the dining table. On golden plates, of course, since nothing less was worthy of holding anything that would touch his lips.

****

A bit flustered by the abruptly posed question, the Automata needed a moment before answering. “I would like to make more friends, your Excellency."

****

Enel nodded to signal the Automata´s dismissal. He planned to use his underling´s response as a reference point for the things which could be liked by those lowlifes who called themselves humans. The reason was a simple yet displeasing one: He had lost his devotees on all the Blues. Not one being believed in his godliness anymore. So he thought about if there really was nothing he could do to show these lowly creatures who their one true god was. To open their unseeing eyes once more and make them gasp at the sight of all his glory. And those lousy idiots would surely like it to get presents, wouldn't they? They were greedy little pests after all and surely wouldn´t dare question a greater being bestowing presents upon them. Even Enel, supreme ruler of all, liked presents, so there surely was no way that humans, weaker and inferior to him in all respects, could resist a present from his wonderful, extraordinary and handsome self.

****

His underling had more or less suggested giving the humans more friends. But Fairy Vearth´s ruler was not particularly convinced by that. Thinking of the cumbersome Straw Hat and his crew, they surely had more than enough friends. No, there had to be something better, something way more valuable to these fools that they lacked at the moment. That was when Enels face brightened. There was one such thing. Did those lowlifes not long for something called ‘true love’? He had heard about it in a few stories from the Blue Sea and always found himself impressed at how utterly ridiculous the people with this feeling of ‘true love’ behaved in them. If this thing could let them handle crazy tasks, make them overcome any hardship or even fly without the use of a Devil Fruit, then surely it would be possible to utilize it in order to make some new devotees, no? He just had to find some rats to test his theory on. Maybe one who was already aware of their infatuation for another but just couldn't get their teeth to part. Yes, truly a glorious idea that could only have been born from his glorious mind.

****

He watched the creatures crawling on the Blues beneath him for a while, before finally deciding on his targets. All he would have to do was gift them with the great present of ‘true love’ and make it plain obvious who gave it to them.

****

His first victims would be...

****


	2. Shachi/Penguin

**Shachi/Penguin**

It was a rather calm day for the Heart Pirates. They had landed on a secluded island which wasn’t marked on their map, where heavy wind blew and lightning struck the earth every now and then. Even so, there was no Marine to be seen remotely close and there weren't any hostile beasts they had to defend themselves against, either. Currently the crew was taking a rest in the middle of a small formation of rocks that acted as a wind shield. They calmly explored the place a few minutes ago, but the steady gusts had grown stronger, so seeking shelter in case of a storm seemed a wise decision while they were this far away from the Polar Tang. 

However… Law doubted it was a good call at the moment. Shachi and Penguin would cost him his last nerve one day. Both of them were debating on how to steal Law´s hat without him noticing for quite a while now. Beside the fact that he definitely would notice someone taking his beloved headdress, the captain of the Heart Pirates could only wonder if the two imbeciles really believed he wouldn’t hear them as they loudly discussed their plans less than five meters away from him. The wind could howl as loud as it wanted, these two were doing their best to shout over it and made their intentions known to every last crew member huddling around Bepo for warmth. Including their captain. While the two were still distracted by their conversation, the surgeon lazily lifted a hand, only a tiny bit. 

“Room.” The uttered word immediately caused both of the men’s hats to appear in his hands. He then raised his voice over the whistling air to speak to the duo. “Don't even think of it or I will hold onto these not only for today.” He waved the orca- and penguin-shaped hats at Shachi and Penguin and put them in the sand right next to him, out of their reach. 

Penguin immediately began whining over their loss. “No, you can't keep them! You´re a monster, captain! We were just joking, you know. J-o-k-i-n-g. You know the word, right?” 

“Yeah! Those are practically parts of our bodies! It´s like holding our hearts hostage!” Shachi added, sounding less whiny and more frustrated. 

Unfortunately for them, their captain did not seem impressed. “Well, it’s a good thing I´m experienced in holding body parts hostage then, wouldn´t you say?” 

“Captain!” they shouted in protest at his rather cold response. 

Regardless of his words, Law tossed the hats back to their rightful owners. “If you ever think of stealing anything from me again, I really hope one of those lightning strikes hits both of you.” With that he leaned back again while the other two were quick to pull their hats over their heads. 

It was then that two flashes of lightning suddenly came down from the grey skies and precisely struck Penguin and Shachi´s foreheads. The whole crew stared at the two unconscious men lying on the ground in shock. Bepo whirled around, his dumbfounded expression directed at Law. 

The Heart´s captain, who had paled considerably, shook his head numbly. “That wasn't me."  
Still he felt at fault. He had just summoned this misfortune, hadn't he? Law´s hands trembled slightly, but he quickly got a hold of himself. He ran the few steps that separated him from the men who, out of all the Hearts, had been by his side and his dearest friends for the longest. Not that he would ever admit that. 

The rest of the crew was slower to approach. With the exception of Bepo they stopped a few steps off to keep out of the surgeon´s way. The orange-clad polar bear on the other hand laid out directly behind the knocked-out men, effectively blocking any wind that managed to get into the stone formation so Law could examine them more easily. That was exactly what he did. He checked their vitals first and was highly relived that both were still breathing and had a steady heartbeat. He made a mental note to never say something provoking a situation like this again. He really hadn't done anything other than making shallow threats, but he was feeling like the worst captain in pirate history at the moment. Pushing the guilt aside, he tried his best to wake his crewmates, for once as careful as possible. 

At least Shachi moaned weakly at the soft shaking and opened his eyes slowly. He looked confused, but that seemed to be quite understandable after being hit by a lightning strike. He directed his eyes to the face of his captain, which was still locked in a display of untypical worry. 

“Whoa, captain, you look worried. Did someone die?” he began teasing Law, before paling the moment he remembered. “Oh, no! Peng isn´t dead, right!? Right?!” 

It would not be an understatement to say the man with the orca hat went ballistic while furiously looking for his friend. 

“He´s most likely OK, just unconscious. Calm down,” Law said, his voice betraying his attempt to act calm himself. 

Shachi found his friend right beside him in the meantime and double checked for himself. Finally satisfied, he exhaled in relief and sunk back into Bepo. 

“Do you feel alright?” Law asked now that the other regained his temper. 

“Yeah, somehow,” the man in question answered, “I don't even feel like I was hit by lightning. Only thing is that my forearm´s itching." 

He then rolled his left boiler suit sleeve up to expose the offending piece of skin, only to freeze and stare at his arm silently. The rest of the crew saw it as well. On his forearm was a tattoo-like mark. It showed the face of a guy in a bathing cap kind of thing with really long earlobes. He had horizontal stripes running over the back his nose and gave anyone watching a thumbs-up, along with the smuggest grin to ever have been grinned. Everyone was paralyzed, not knowing what to make of the picture. They surely did not know the man depicted on Shachi´s arm. However, their attention shifted the moment they realized Penguin had started moving as well. 

“Peng!” Shachi happily called out, dragging the other into a firm hug. 

After a brief moment of hesitation Law decided to join in, getting stunned expressions in return. That was, until Bepo couldn't hold back the relief and happiness about his friends being alright any longer. It surely was a unique experience to almost be crushed by a polar bear´s hug after two of his friends survived a charge of high voltage like that unharmed. Still, even Law had to smile. And with that, the rest of the Hearts took it as permission to fling their arms around the quartet. Any bystander who might have witnessed the spectacle would surely have wondered why these feared pirates were piling up on one another and how it was even possible for them to remain in their positions for such an extended time without someone getting squeezed to death. They managed somehow. 

After their impromptu cuddle-session the crew returned to their regular schedule of being puzzled. Shachi and Penguin had already figured that Law was not at fault for the lightning strikes by themselves. First of all they knew that he never had any intention of hurting his own crew and second of all- What the hell, Law was cuddling out of his free will? Usually they had to work hard to be allowed to clap his shoulder without receiving a death glare. This day should immediately and permanently be marked as a holiday. It was a miracle occurring every thousand years or so. That alone showed how taken aback their captain was by the whole thing. 

The questions still remaining were: Who was the man in the tattoo and why had he hit them with lightning all of a sudden? They guessed they would not get any further with the information currently available to them and that they would have to wait until they met people they could ask about that strange earlobe-man. At least they noticed that Penguin had the exact same tattoo that Shachi sported, in the exact same place on his arm. They recognized the lightning did not really hurt them, either. It was only the shock, the unconsciousness and this odd tattoo, which at least had stopped itching. For the time being they decided to finish their exploration of the unknown island and get back to the lightning-free zone undersea as soon as possible. 

After a particularly strong gust of air passed by, Ikkaku began snickering. Receiving questioning glances from her fellow crew members, she pointed at Penguin´s forehead first and then at Shachi´s. The wind had managed to push their hats back on their heads a little. 

“What´s that? Did you two get matching tattoos while drunk?” she cackled, just to falter when she remembered Law using his ‘Room' to get a hold of the duo´s hats. “Wait, those tattoos on your foreheads, they weren’t there when we arrived here.” She continued looking stunned as the two felt for the tattoos in question and turned to look at each other. 

“I love this lowly idiot” was written on both of their faces. The letters were followed by an arrow pointing in the direction of the other. Penguin cautiously moved a step away and to the side. Sure enough, the pointing arrow adjusted, continuously pointing at the man with the orca hat. Both blushed deeply. 

Bepo shouted “I knew it!” and happily clapped his paws together. The whole crew smiled because they were happy for the two and glad that the pining, which was quite obvious to all but the two, would stop. Law was smiling for the same reasons, but more than that he did it because he found himself well entertained by the insult on their foreheads that no one else seemed to care about. 

After a minute though, the Heart´s captain frowned. Shouldn't he be the only one insulting his crew members? What if the person writing that harbored ill intentions? He looked back at his men, laughing carelessly and enjoying teasing the newly formed couple, and shook his head. No way. Maybe he would even need to thank that earlobe-guy with the striped nose for helping those two out and bringing them happiness. Of course that would only happen after he kicked that guy´s butt for electrocuting and insulting his crewmates. 


	3. Mihawk/Zeff

**Interlude: Enel**

The great, glorious, and handsome Enel was very pleased with himself. He truly was the best, the one and only god! He had done splendid work, indeed. Nothing could stop him now. His plan was already in action, and of course he would never be mistaken! All of those foolish humans would pray to him. 

His first attempt at bestowing the lowlifes with the thing called ‘true love’ was already a huge success. He was so great that he knew they would very soon be more than glad to bow before him. And since they would miss his presence and yearn for his beautiful face, he came up with one of the most brilliant ideas- again. He was a genius, without a single doubt. 

He ordered the Automata to produce articles with his likeness stamped onto them. First, he demanded a shirt to be designed with his dazzling form pressed onto it: In a dynamic pose, jumping, holding a bow with a lightning arrow attached, shooting it right through a sparking heart. Second was a bathing cap with the words ‘I ♡ Enel & Enel ♡ me’ Stitched onto it. That was a bit of an overstatement, really. But for some reason, the Automata begged not to write ‘I ♡Enel & Enel will show mercy towards my pitiful self, because he is the glorious, most handsome, wonderful, only true god that shall rule over everything and be my guiding light’. Such insolence. The only reason he could think of for not pushing his own, superior, version was that the space on the cap was too limited. A pity, really. 

There was a third article as well. It was designed for those inclined to more practical thinking: The infinitely useful Enel coffee mug. It had exactly the right size and was so light that even a baby could drink milk out of it. Easy to heat up and therefore heat resistant as well. He had to think of everyone, had he not? He could not afford someone like that Fire Fist kid to burn his wonderfully designed objects of worship (by accident, of course, no one would dare doing such a thing on purpose), so everything had to be fire-proof. 

Since the process of refining the line of products was still ongoing, he had also ordered a little gift to rain on the humans in the meantime: A simple button. Just like the coffee mug, his face was printed onto it, with an additional thumbs up- The tattoo he marked orca-hat and penguin-hat with, but this was the final version of the design. The one with a small heart above the outstretched thumb. Oh, how he loved this detail. The heart would only show up on the tattoo after a successful matchmaking had taken place. 

Enel took immense pride in his refined sense for art. The two lucky human underlings had not even noticed so far. They had started whining about the still remaining tattoo on their foreheads instead. Mumbling something about it being offending, or something like that. They should be grateful! Everything coming from his supreme self was better than the lousy excuse of art they had in the Blue Sea. 

However, even if they could have hidden his godly words under their hats, he had to undo them out of pure goodwill. It really had nothing to do with the fact that he feared to lose his new devotees as quickly as he had gained them. It also had nothing to do with the aura of sheer killing intent their captain emitted every time he saw the tattoos and of course was completely unrelated to the death glares said men sent towards the sky every now and then, seemingly looking straight at Enel. Nope, none of those. It was only out of the kindness of his heart. Thinking about it… maybe a Shirt with the words ‘I love this lowly idiot’ and arrows pointing to the left and right would make a fitting present for those fool´s birthdays, or any random occasion. The date didn´t matter. He really only wanted to mock them- Pardon, bring them happiness through divine gifts. 

So who would be his next vict- lucky ones? Maybe he should give the Heart Pirates a break. It should be someone completely different. Advertisement for all ages would be fantastic, wouldn’t it? So how about those two middle aged men…

**Chapter 3: Mihawk/Zeff**

Mihawk reminisced about his last meeting with Zoro. The boy´s swordsmanship seriously improved every time they crossed paths. 

"But he should care more about his life. He is still young," he thought to himself. 

"It really wouldn’t be nice if the young ones get in any danger," the thought was continued. 

The swordsman froze. That was not exactly his opinion. Danger was fine, as long as they didn’t overdo it. So why was he thinking of danger as negative in general now? It could benefit the growth of body and soul to face challenges, and even more to overcome them. 

"It wouldn’t help at all if the children got hurt- or worse, die." 

Now Mihawk was sure that the voice in his head was not his own spinning thoughts, at least not only that. But he was sailing alone in his coffin boat. No one was around, right? He scanned the area for any hint of enemies and found none. Only waves underneath him and clouds above.

"There´s hellish amounts of people at my place, but judging by your conclusions I can tell that you´re a cautious person and not in company at the moment. Listen. I don’t know why, but suddenly I was worrying about this Zoro boy and I guess those were your thoughts, since I would most likely prefer thinking about Sanji instead. Even so, I have to say that Zoro is a highly skilled man, too. He may be grumpy from time to time but I’m sure he´s a good boy. His swordsmanship is just as amazing as Sanji´s cooking."

Mihawk took no time to wonder about his newly required telepathy. He had better things to devote his thoughts to. Like talking to this guy- whoever he might be- about Zoro. If he remembered correctly, the Sanji he mentioned was one of Zoro´s Nakama, and he could not let a chance to gather intel about his protégé´s progression pass by. 

"Well, would you mind talking about those two more? One could say… I’m interested in the topic," the wielder of the black blade asked, making sure that his hopes did not show in his mental voice. 

"Of course I wouldn´t mind!" the unknown person answered. "Don’t tell Sanji, but I’m always worried about the dumb little brat. It kinda feels like he´s my own child. And Zoro is one of his friends, so I’m grateful for any information I can get."

Their talks continued as the days passed by. Since they could hear each other´s thoughts only from time to time, randomly starting and stopping, they did not always talk about ‘their boys’ but about other things as well. Like wine. The delicate drink was something both seemed to enjoy and Zeff (that was the other´s name as Mihawk learned), was a cook and had numerous recommendations. The moment Mihawk mentioned that he would love to try some of the wines, he was invited to the swimming restaurant ‘Baratie’. He accepted the invitation. Talking to the other man in actuality would surely be nicer than having his voice in his head all the time. They could discuss Zoro and Sanji more over a few glasses of good wine. Maybe they could even figure out why they were able to communicate like they did. He was surprised himself that he got that excited over such a simple meeting. However, he had to wait until late at night, after the restaurant was closed to the public, so the chef would have time to talk. 

For the time being Mihawk leaned back and sailed his own ocean of memories. He recalled his first encounter with the Straw Hats and then his own early days, when he was eager to get stronger himself, training incessantly day after day. He remembered the first time he swung the black blade he carried on his back. A clear image of his younger self was projected before his inner eye. That was when he heard the other´s voice again. 

“That’s you? You sure looked stunning. Just, how can I put this… Your sense of fashion was… Unique? No, more like, completely something else?” 

Mihawk´s thoughts were tumbling over themselves. Was that actual critique? He himself was of the opinion that he looked rather dashing back then and liked his former attitude and style of clothing even now. So what could it be the other disliked? His beard, trimmed evenly into sharp triangles that framed his face? It looked a bit like scattering shadows, so he really liked the feature. He had just grown out of it. No, it could not be the beard. So how about his shirt? It was interesting, even unusual. The spider-web-like net part around the collar was his favorite thing about the garment. It gave off an air of mystery. The fabric was also ripped in some parts. He had thought he looked more experienced, like he had just stepped off a battle field. It surely made him feel strong back then, even if he thought it somewhat childish now. But then Mihawk noticed what had upset the other man in his head: The admittedly worst part of the outfit were his trousers. They were so incredibly plain. There was absolutely nothing special about them. Mihawk surely wished he had paid more attention in the past and had at least added some extras, like silver chains. 

On a second thought he had to ask himself: Why was he so shaken right now? Because he had received critique? No, he was used to it due to his position as one of the Seven Warlords. Most likely because he had received critique from a specific person- The cook in his head. Mihawk silenced his torrent of thoughts and tried to listen for the other man´s voice. He had to have listened to everything his brain had spat out in the last minutes, hadn’t he? And indeed he was able to make out a soft snickering in the back of his mind. 

“I just started to laugh like a madman in the middle of my kitchen while chopping onions! I bet half of the newer staff thinks I´m crazy right now. The others know already, so it’s fine. But let me tell you, your style was simply… Jaw-dropping, alright? No offense, but you cut your hair like raven wings or something and put a pitch black hat on it to make a beak. With red eyes on it. Really, that screamed to be commented on. Who on all the Blues does something like that?”

“Well, I did,” Mihawk answered, taken aback, then continued, “I bet you made some interesting style choices in your youth as well.” 

Suddenly an image flashed in, showing a young woman with blond braids reaching to the floor. A chef´s hat sat high on her head and she held a kitchen knife pointed upward in a pose of victory. Her boots looked heavy. Surely they were reinforced with a double layer of metal, making it easy to kick someone’s ass if need be. One of her legs was propped up on a beaten pirate on the ground. The outfit she wore was black, except for the hat and an apron with a cape on it. A cape-apron hybrid? Sure, this was special. 

Mihawk heard a thought coming from the other man. “You know this isn't a woman… That’s me, back when I was younger.” 

Fair enough. The swordsman had already thought that the woman had a particularly sharp jaw line, almost rivaling his own. So he was not too surprised. Still, there was one question that just begged to be asked. 

“Where did you get the apron-cape? And are they available in black as well?”

*****

When Mihawk walked into the restaurant-ship ‘Baratie’ after opening hours, he was immediately greeted by the blond cook who introduced himself as Zeff. They sat and talked and noticed they shared even more interests apart from their protégés and drinking fine wine. As the night went on, both were surprised to find out that they had been hit by lightning not long before and discovered tattoo-like marks on their forearms afterward. Their telepathic link opened shortly after. Zeff served Mihawk a delicious dinner after showing him how to combine a cape and an apron into a cape-apron, since it was a creation of his own making.

"This guy,” Zeff explained later, tapping the preposterous tattoo they both had, “calls himself Enel. Sanji and his Nakama met him, the boy wrote a letter mentioning him once. He seems to refrain to himself as ‘God’."  
"God of love?" It was only a quick thought on Mihawk´s side, not voiced at all, but Zeff answered out loud, showing that he had heard. 

"Maybe," he said and refilled Mihawk´s glass. "If so, he surely isn’t too bad at his job."


	4. Marco/Ace

**Chapter 4 : Marco/Ace**

Evening had come and the Moby Dick was gliding steadily through the waves. Ace was done with his work for the day and sat on the railing, looking at the horizon. A few clouds drifted by and a calming breeze stroked his black hair. He let his gaze drift over the ship´s deck. His siblings were mostly done with their work, too. Marco stood close to their father, discussing something with him. That was when it happened. 

Suddenly a single lightning strike came down from the otherwise calm sky, hitting the phoenix completely unprepared. As the man, flaming up in bright blue fire, hit the deck, everyone was shocked. Whitebeard, who was sitting directly in front of his son, made a move to stand up and examine him. Before he could do so, Marco quickly rose to his feet. 

“I'm alright, pops. You don´t have to get up, yoi,” the still burning Devil Fruit user announced. 

He swiftly checked his own condition and silently thanked his regenerating powers, even if he hadn't felt pain for a single moment. Marco extinguished his flames and furrowed his brows, wondering about the lack of pain and one other detail. 

“Hey, wasn’t that lightning kind of blue colored? That sure did look familiar, didn´t it, yoi?” 

At that, the newer crewmates looked lost, while everyone that was on board back at the Summit War, or earlier, at the time of Blackbeard’s betrayal, widened their eyes in surprise. They surely did recognize that blue lightning. The first time they saw it was when Teach tried to kill Thatch. Everyone on the ship had been startled by the sudden strike of lightning busting through their deck into the lower levels of the ship. Soon after Blackbeard had stumbled out from underdeck and made his escape, before everyone rushed to the lightly wounded chef who told them about what happened. Apparently Teach had tried to kill him, but then there was the lightning that hit them both. Teach actually had seemed to be hurt from it, while Thatch´s only injury was the one brought to him by the traitor. 

The second time was at Ace´s planned execution. That time everyone witnessed the blue lightning piercing through the sky. Twice. Once, it hit Ace and his shackles, effectively breaking the Seastone. It seemingly did not hurt, exactly like the time Thatch got struck by it. The second one did obviously hurt. It slammed into Akainu, right at the time he was getting ready to deal his final blow to their 2nd division commander. The admiral had dropped unconscious after delivering a much weaker punch than intended. 

They had been incredibly lucky on that day. Every last one of them was prepared to die at Marineford, but there were no injuries dealt that were severe enough to not be healed by the surgeon of death, who had lingered nearby, and their own ship doctors. However, they were never able to figure out who had helped them. So why did lightning hit Marco just now? There was no impending danger, so everyone on board of the Moby was fairly confused. Since Marco picked up the conversation he had with their father again and didn't seem to care too much, the others decided to let it slide. 

*********

Meanwhile, the great Enel furrowed his perfectly shaped eyebrows. He had listened to the foolish thoughts of the humans and had remembered- How was it even possible for him to forget such an important measure of advertisement? How could he forget those pirates were indebted to him? Well, the answer was simple, really. The first rescue he had not known about. The second he had not cared about. His godly mind simply had greater things to think about. Like the newest beauty cream his Automata underlings had created especially for him after he had ordered something smelling of roses. But now he remembered. 

The time Enel had saved that kitchen rat they called Thatch he had played around in Skypiea. He had been bored and wanted to see how far he could throw his lightning. He was considerate at the time and had restrained his powers because he wanted to try out being this thing people called a hero, it sounded like fun. He never knew that he really had hit the mark on that day and saved someone. He was only thinking of hitting Thatch since he was a fiend to Whitebeards crew. So it was a good thing after all that he had the lightning spear designed in a way that it would only hurt those with malicious intent. He definitely could use that incidence to get more devotees. But he should claim that he knew all along about the situation and saved the cook out of sheer goodwill. That would surely give some points to get on their good side. 

And then there was that second incident. The one with the lava-man. Enel had, in fact, fried that one on purpose. Not out of pity, no. It was not too long after he settled on Fairy Vearth and he found himself thoroughly bored by the lifeforms crawling on its surface. So he decided to lend a hand in the Blue Sea, since he had enjoyed watching that annoying Straw Hat for quite a while and did not want this source of entertainment to cease because the brat would accidently die trying to protect the Fire Fist one. Moreover that Straw Hat had… Not… Won against him… Ah, yes- He had a lucky day confronting Enel on Skypiea. Therefore, the latter was not willing to see the rubber boy lose against the lava-man in the hideous shirt. That was the only intention behind it. 

Of course the Whitebeard Pirates would get a whole other story sometime soon. This makeshift family was so crazy huge. Just imagining gaining so many new underlings made Enel smirk in satisfaction. But now- back to the topic at hand. Operation ‘Blue fire Chicken’ had just gone underway, didn´t it? And operations ‘Test 1.0’ and ‘Deadly Dads’ were already a success. So nothing could go wrong, right? 

*********

“But pizza isn’t unhealthy by any means! I can think of a lot of green things to put on pizza,” Ace proclaimed. 

The Whitebeard crew´s cook raised one eyebrow to show that he was all ears for a proper example of a green pizza topping. Ace had been looking for Thatch to make a request for the food he wanted to have that day. People tended to say that he ate everything, but that was not true. He just gave off that vibe because he ate so damn much of the stuff he liked at a time. The fire user began thinking hard. There were vegetables like broccoli or Brussel sprouts. OK, frankly, no sane person would put that on pizza. It was kind of disgusting. But there were other perfectly fine toppings! Like tomatoes. They weren’t commonly green, though. Salad then, maybe? Would that be edible on pizza? 

“No, it’s not. It will be way more disgusting than broccoli. Which is not disgusting at all, by the way, yoi,” a voice suddenly echoed in his head. 

Ace was not able to put a face to the voice, because he had never heard it before. He just noticed the ending. That was usually a thing Marco tacked on to nearly every sentence he spoke. Well, the boy could not be blamed for not recognizing who really put the words into his head. It was the great Enel´s personal decision to broadcast every thought from one man to another, and he did so in his own beautiful voice. These humans had to learn the sound of true divinity and had to get familiar with him as soon as possible. 

Without thinking too much about the strange voice, Ace mentally pleaded for help. “But I need something green that can be eaten on pizza. I need it fast and I have to be fine with eating it as well.” 

Thatch started to look annoyed. Ace had to act quickly! He could have sworn that he heard Marco sigh in that moment, but the man was nowhere around. Right? Ace turned to make sure, but the phoenix was nowhere to be seen. Thatch however seemed to a take it as an indicator that his younger brother had no clue and opened his mouth to put an end to the charade. That was when Ace heard the stranger´s voice again. 

“You know, even your definition of healthy is wrong. Healthy does not equal green. But oh well, if you search for a green vegetable, then how about green paprika, yoi?” the voice suggested. 

Ace´s freckled face brightened in an instant. He quickly interrupted his brother´s attempt to scold him. “Paprika! It’s green paprika!” he yelled out as if his live was on the line. In some way it was, at least his live as a pizza loving pirate who denied acknowledgement of broccoli being a viable option for being put on the divine blessing of God. 

Enel had a small thought then that he was not the one gifting the humans with pizza. So that brat had to be wrong about the divine blessing thing. Maybe he could use the misguided assumption for advertisement. 

However, Thatch seemed satisfied with the answer. “Fine, pizza it is. I´ll put other healthy stuff on it besides paprika, but I´ll make sure to make lots with different toppings, OK?” 

Ace nodded. That truly sounded fair. With that he left the kitchen to not hinder their ship´s chef. He moved on to the next point on his agenda, added only a few moments ago. 

He concentrated hard and honestly thanked his unknown benefactor. “Thanks for your help! You really saved me and my dinner back there!” 

“Well. No problem, I suppose, yoi". 

Ace smiled an unseen, but nevertheless bright, smile. “You know, it’s funny! You use the same way to end a sentence as a very good friend of mine!” 

“Have I, yoi?” The voice sounded a little irritated. “I´ve never met someone saying ‘yoi’ at the end of a sentence besides me, yoi". 

“Marco, yoi, does, yoi," Ace mocked. 

The silence he was met with as it dawned on him that he had said something wrong was broken by a disbelieving “What?!” that seemed to not to be directed at him directly, but to be more of a general thought. 

The other then responded. “You just said that that Marco fella´s a very good friend of yours, yoi?” 

Ace nodded before realizing that he could not be seen by his conversation partner. “Yeah. He´s also my brother,” he stated. 

“You don’t say, yoi." The voice sounded drained of all life for some reason. 

Ace suddenly heard a wave of thoughts rushing in from the other end. The person was obviously thinking very hard at the moment. And Ace was able to hear every single bit of it. 

“Who could he be? Ace? He seriously behaves like him. But then again, that isn't his voice, I would be able to recognize it everywhere and that isn't it. So I could try to figure it out that way. Which person has that voice? Oh, seriously, I can't remember anyone that sounded like this. Is it someone new to the crew? It has to be, right? I mean, I know everyone on the ship and I just can't recognize them. Ah, I'm so sorry, I have to work even harder in the future. As the 1st division’s commander, there´s a need to-" 

“Could you please stop overthinking it? You even forgot the ‘yoi' and it makes my head hurt," Ace interrupted. 

“You- You heard that, yoi?!” the shock echoed through the fire user’s head. 

“Yup, I did. It seems we hear most of each other´s thoughts. But please, calm down Marco- and that’s who you obviously have to be, Mister I-Have-To-Overwork-Myself-Even-Harder-1st-Division-Commander.” He continued to speak into the stunned silence. “There´s no need to be worried. You assumed right at the start. It´s me, Ace. I hear a stranger´s voice, not yours, too, but that’s fine. The ‘yoi' gave you away.” 

Marco´s unintentional reply came immediately. “Oh, I was never happier about my speech pattern. And I´m so glad that it´s just Ace.”  
Ace pondered, standing on the stairs leading up to the Moby´s deck for the fifteenth or so consecutive minute. His siblings slowly started giving him weird looks. They were used to his unusual tomfoolery, but him standing still and staring into air like a dead fish while grimacing vividly was something new. 

“What do you mean, it's ‘just' Ace?" 

Laughter drifted over. Not the stranger´s voice, but Marco´s. Like the sigh he had heard earlier. 

“I meant that in the most positive way possible, believe me. Imagine that a complete stranger could read your thoughts. That´s way worse than me doing it. Right, yoi?” 

Ace seriously thought about it, forgetting that Marco would listen in. “At least a stranger wouldn´t care that I started to like Pineapples after I met Marco. And that I like him way too much. Like, I would even try broccoli on pizza because he said- thought- that it's OK, so it has to be, right? And- OH, SHI- You did not hear that Marco, did you?! If you have, forget about it immediately!!!” 

“About you being willing to try broccoli on pizza, yoi?” the phoenix shot back jokingly. 

“Yeah, that! Wait- No, not that, the other thing about me loving you and- What the hell?! I´m only making this worse!” 

Marco´s deep chuckles could be heard over the lapping waves beneath. “Don't worry about it, yoi. I'm actually glad. Pretty sure none of us would have spoken up about it any time soon, right? So, yeah, I like you too. Or- love. You know what I mean, yoi.” 

Ace’s stare became more and more befuddled. A passing Izo stopped in his tracks to lightly shake Ace's shoulder. “Are you alright? You look confused. Maybe a little pale, too. Are you unwell? Did you eat spoiled food again?” 

“Ah? Ah, oh, no, no, it’s fine. Thank you, Izo. I just thought about the pizza Thatch´s making. Do you think he´ll put pineapple on it, too? I love pineapples, you know.” 

The other man squinted, skeptical. “Is that so? I'm sure there will be some pineapple pizza… You´re sure you´re alright though?” 

“Yeah, totally am!” Ace blurted before he dashed off to the kitchen. Dinner should be ready soon and he would like to avoid any embarrassing situations right now. 

Just then Marco´s voice bounced around his head again. “Two things. First, it wasn't very nice of you to leave poor Izo standing like that. Second, I really do feel twisted about the fact you connect me with pineapples and still want to eat them sliced and baked on pizza.” 


	5. Kid/Law

**Chapter 5: Kid/Law**

Enel was drawing. Not a picture, but a map. A map showing every human he had observed in his pastime and all the others connected to them. He of course had a higher reason behind it other than showing off his divine artistic skills. It was meant to help find perfect matches faster. He noted down everyone´s relationships with little symbols and was currently staring disapprovingly at a certain black line connecting two famous pirates. Over the line was the drawing of crossed swords, showing that those two were fighting on a regular basis. 

Enel´s problem with the matter at hand was that in his righteous opinion, the both of them would make a perfect match. His hard but godly task was therefore to get those fools to stop harming each other and finally find their ‘true love’. He thought about a tactic befitting his selfless mission and finally grinned, pleased once again with his own genius. He knew exactly what to do. 

*****

The man in Victoria Punk´s crow´s nest shouted, “The surgeon´s submarine to the West! They´re surfacing!” 

His captain, Eustass Kid, did a double take at that. His already angry-looking face instantly became even angrier-looking as he held out a hand for the telescope Heat used to peer into the direction of the horizon their lookout had indicated. The man handed it over without a word. He knew his captain too well to interfere once the redhead had spotted the Surgeon of Death. 

The voice of reason came, as always, from Killer. “Captain, shouldn´t we avoid all-out fights for the moment? Given your current state…” he began, never finishing his sentence. 

Kid understood nonetheless. “I won't back out of a fight with Trafalgar just because I was hit by damn lightning and felt a little tickle every now and then,” he growled, the displeased set of his brow drawing deep lines into his forehead. 

The crew knew that it was far worse than the ‘little tickle every now and then' that Kid made it out to be. If his constant grimaces were any indication of even half of the pain he had felt seemingly at random for the last few days, then he was not alright at all. Too late to worry about the matter now though, because the other pirate crew obviously had spotted them as well. The yellow submarine came closer.

Kid´s crew dropped into fighting stances when the air around them crackled and Trafalgar Law, his crew in tow, landed on their ship´s deck in a blue flash.

Kid gritted his teeth. “Nice to meet you again, Trafalgar,” he snarled in greeting, voice dripping with sarcasm. 

He wasted no time in charging forward to strike the surgeon with his metallic arm. Trafalgar dodged, using that pesky ability of his at the same time to help out his scattering crewmates. 

Fights between the crews had gone down like this for months now. Seemingly brutal but quite tame at a second glance. They never lasted longer than a few hours, no one was left with deadly injuries, and the verbal battles were more exhausting than the physical fights at times. Still they fought every single time they crossed paths. Still they could just not act civil around each other.

Each side harbored a certain degree of respect for the other, which was why neither seriously intended to fight until death. The truth of it was that their sporadic clashes were a rather welcome occurrence for all parties involved. In a way they served as tests of strength- training even- but anyone calling them that would have been served a sucker punch by Kid personally. So it was war. War against… Somewhat friendly enemies. The sheer glee glinting in every man´s eyes, no matter which crew they hailed from, spoke for the twisted sense of competition that drew them towards one another time and time again.

It was when the two captains finally landed a successful hit on the other that they both froze in place. Kid had used his magnetism to cut Trafalgar´s right arm with a stolen sword, pulled from one of the surgeon´s crewmates. Trafalgar on the other hand had used his Devil Fruit powers to summon a nearby barrel and drop it on the other´s goggled head. The weird thing was- Trafalgar was holding his own head now as if he´d been the one struck by several dozen kilograms of gunpowder, while Kid hissed at his right arm. 

The nearby pirates halted their skirmishes immediately. Only one of the crews had the slightest idea what was going down on the Kid Pirate´s ship in that moment. They had seen the lightning strike hitting their captain a few days ago, as they had witnessed before. They had also seen the tattoo of a man with stripes on the back of his nose between their captain´s numerous other tattoos and knew that one all too well, also. 

“No way in hell!” Trafalgar spat, answering the curious stares of his crewmembers. “That earlobe guy has to be fucking insane!” 

He turned and called forth his blue dome again to transport his crew and himself back onto their ship. The Kid Pirates were left behind in a state of stunned confusion. A long silence followed the yellow submarine´s departure, vanishing under the water´s surface as quickly as it had appeared. 

“Earlobe guy?” Killer asked, sounding as clueless as they all felt. 

“No fucking clue,” his captain answered. “But it seems I have to kick that asshole´s butt for zapping me.” 

*****

Even the glorious Enel had to admit that the confrontation could have shaken out better. Still, how foolish those humans were. Calling him insane and saying they would kick his butt. They had no idea how much effort he exerted on them on a daily basis! He would show them that they better only proclaimed their gratitude from now on. They would love him after finally getting together. Maybe the redhead was a bit of a loose cannon most of the time. Maybe he denied his feelings. And maybe the man´s clothing awoke bad memories of the tall blond ‘Joker', who also seemed to wear a dead animal on his back, in the other sad man. Still the supreme Enel was sure he just had to give them more time. They would surely start to recognize their true feelings then and thank him for his guidance. Just a little bit longer.

*****

Two more weeks passed until Kid had a funny idea. The other captain seemingly felt every bit of pain he felt, so… He stood on the deck, surrounded by busy crewmembers passing by. That was when he suddenly slapped himself, hard. The other pirates gave him shocked looks and Kid could have sworn that Killer was furrowing his eyebrows in concern behind his mask.  
“I wonder if that bastard Trafalgar could feel that, too.” Kid shrugged, dismissing his worrying crewmembers. 

From then on he slapped himself on occasion. He did it especially when the news hit him that Trafalgar maybe was in an important meeting. He also loved to do it in the dead of night, when he, at times, could not sleep. Hell, how he loved this. Of course he disliked the fact that every slap hurt him as well, but just imagining the unnerved look on Trafalgar made him forget about his own pain. It was totally worth it. And he continued. That was, until he felt the burning sensation of a small thin but no less sharp blade shoved in his thigh.

Law was not amused. Not at all. It wasn't enough that his mates, Shachi and Penguin mostly, were haunting him with the idea of Eustass and him getting together. No, the red haired imbecile seemed to be slapping himself constantly at the worst times. Law was smart enough to imagine why. He had tried to sleep for hours now and finally managed to drift off, when a sudden pain on his cheek made him jolt wide awake again. That was what made him snap. He bolted out of his cabin. 

“That fucking freak, I will make so damn sure that he´ll regret this,” he cursed while stomping to the operating room. 

It was unusual for him to loose his cool and he was way louder than he normally would be, which caused his crewmembers to wake up. He heard Shachi´s voice behind him. 

“Hey, captain. Can't you sleep again? I mean, that’s nothing new but you seem... off. Are you…-“ 

The concerned orca hatted man fell silent when he recognized that Law had no intention of answering him. Instead, his captain entered the operating room without losing a word and slammed the door shut behind him, locking it. Everyone blinked in confusion, staring at the now sealed door. 

“Captain?”, Penguin tried to reach out. Like the redhead before, he got no answer. “What´s he planning to do in there anyway?”, he muttered. 

He got a “Nothing good, that’s for sure" from an alarmed Bepo for an answer.

Meanwhile Law had singled out the sharpest scalpel he could find in the operating room´s cabinets. He had placed himself on the table in its middle, sitting as comfortably as possible. He had decided on a place he could afford to stab without unnecessarily cutting muscles our veins and raised the scalpel, looking up, towards the ceiling and beyond, because he had the uncertain feeling that earlobe guy was somewhere high up there. 

“If you continue that bullshit, I can play that game, too. Accept that we don't match already and stop it,” he demanded, announcing his intention to fight back. 

Then he rammed the scalpel into the soft part of his thigh, right at the moment a very furious and even more worried polar bear crashed trough the door, effectively breaking the lock. Law, with the blade still in his flesh, blinked at him. 

“I should have known you would do that,” he sighed, a small smile on his lips. 

His smile grew wider as he watched the tattoo on his forearm fade away slowly.


	6. Law/Luffy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello :)  
> Thanks for all the Kudos and Reviews!  
> I hope this chapter is enjoyable even if it is not Beta-read this time.

**Chapter 6 Law/Luffy**

The glorious Enel could not believe it. One of his throne room walls displayed the movements on the Blues. Around thirty Automata were at his side, some of them eating popcorn while watching the scenery in front of them. 

He refused to assume he had not succeeded. Surely it was all those humans´ fault. How dare they refuse to accept his divine gift of true love? That black haired imbecile even dared to personally offend him by telling him that he had failed. Him, the glorious Enel. There was no way that could even be possible. 

The result was to blame fully on his targeted pair. They clearly did wrong, not him, never him. He was always in the right. And he would get those two to find their luck. Just maybe he would reconsider them finding luck with each other. What a pity. But they were the perfect match he had found. So, who could be better fitting for each one of them? 

Enel regarded the display in front of him. The polar bear was cuddling the Surgeon of Death to death, quite ironical, nearly drowning the man in his fur. The happy couple that had the honor to be his first success was treating the wound in the man´s thigh while pushing white fur out of their way.  
The rest of the crew was giving shrugs and moved on to repairing the door or getting a hold of the mess the captain and polar bear caused in general. Those pirates clearly loved their captain and he did love them, too. Still that wasn't what Enel the Wise looked for. 

He went back to his drawing, which was unfolded on the ground. He needed better options. After studying it carefully he nodded to himself. At the moment he had no idea whom to match with that Eustass Kid.

Maybe the man´s lipstick could make a good match, but aside of that Enel saw no one befitting of the rowdy redhead for the time being. For the Surgeon of Death on the other hand… Enel smiled one of his most evil smiles. He would not give him a rest after directly insulting his supreme self.

*****

All Heart Pirates went pale the moment another stroke of blue lightning came down in the early hours of the morning, following the restless night. It, again, hit their captain. Law closed his eyes, now a bit more prepared for the impact than the first time. He did not go down and tried to calm himself with deep breathing exercises before opening his eyes again and looking at his forearm. There was that damn tattoo again. He sent one of his most furious glares at the sky. Then he started cursing. So bad that it even got his crewmember´s ears- which were well-acquainted with vile language, belonging to pirates and all that- ringing. 

The surgeon did not stop until a pair of arms wrapped around him in a comforting gesture. He had not even noticed Penguin coming closer. His look was a mixture of honest concern and the natural fear someone felt when entering the personal space of the Surgeon of Death without permission. He could be roomed into the ocean, after all. Nevertheless, Shachi and Penguin were two of the most fearless people regarding that matter. A lot of practical experience got them here. Law stopped cursing, even leaning his head against his friend´s shoulder. 

“It's alright captain. Maybe this time it´s someone reasonable,” Penguin tried to be reassuring and brought forth his best and only argument: “It worked out for Shachi and me.” 

Law only nodded, not feeling like talking right now. 

The days passed and nothing happened. No sudden pain, no stress, not anything at all. The Heart Pirate´s captain tentatively started to relax and forget about the fact that the earlobe guy had struck again. It was only two weeks later that Law noticed a change for the first time. There were some odd scribbles mixed between the tattoos on his body. To be more precise, they were all over his right arm, from his hand up to his shoulder. 

He was alone in his room, changing his clothes for the night, when he noticed. Alone like this, no one would pry. At least not for the moment. He tried to decipher the scribbles and made out a bad drawing of something kind of oval, with something green on top. There was a line in the oval and two little dots above the line, closer to the green part. Was that supposed to be a face? With moss on top? Oh, wait. With hair, probably. He recalled the Straw Hat´s cook calling their sword fighter Moss Head. If that on his arm was supposed to be him, then the artist was the worst one ever. 

The Heart pirate looked at the other scribbles. Another thing that could potentially be a face caught his eye. This one had a nose, a very long one on top of that. It just had to be the cowardly marksman. Now Law finally recognized all of the Straw Hat pirates on his arm, with the exception of their captain, who seemed to be missing from the picture. The artist seemed to be Usopp, given the crown and the shining outlines drawn around him. 

Law was a bit irritated by that. He was fairly sure Usopp was decent at drawing. However, the absence of the Straw Hat captain told Law he was potentially the one that was being hinted at here, meaning he could be the one that man with the striped nose wanted him to get together with this time. Better than Kid, he had to admit. Way better. But still, Law decided to keep his mouth shut whenever he would next meet the Straw Hats. He would not play that earlobe guy´s games.

*****

Meanwhile, Enel sat on the moon and was not pleased with the turn of events. He had forgotten his lightning did not work on the rubbery pest. Therefore, his plan to let the ink appear on their bodies in the same places did not work out well. The annoying Straw Hat with tattoos all over him surely would have been a sight to see. 

But no, he had to transfer the doodles from the long nosed clown´s sketchbook to the surgeons arm by himself. And then that lowlife insulted him again! He dubbed him the ‘worst artist ever' without even batting an eye! What extraordinary foolish behavior. To top it off, he even decided not to tell anyone about the supreme one´s freshly planned couple. Absolutely unforgiveable. Now Enel was furious. And dead set on giving the Straw Hat brat a hint as well. A very obvious one. That man got along with everyone. If someone was compatible with the Surgeon of Death then it had to be him.

*****

Things on the Thousand Sunny had calmed down again. After blue lightning had hit their captain not too long ago, everyone was on guard and ready for a fight. They recognized the charge of electricity and knew very well who it belonged to. But the rubber boy was unaffected by the lightning strike, as usual. Since the self-proclaimed god did not show up either, they dropped the subject with time passing by. 

Now they were landing on a small isle, wanting to refill their supplies at a small town behind a row of hills. However, before they could cross them, the lightning came again. It was a lightning storm, in fact. Slashes struck the side of one of the grassy hills. Every stroke left scorched earth behind until finally the last charge came down, ending the flashes of blue. The Straw Hats stared, some with their mouths agape. 

“Whoa!” Luffy hooted. 

He was amazed by the picture in front of him, like all of them were. The once green bump of earth was now covered in lines that made a picture, which clearly reminded the Straw Hats of something- or rather, someone- in particular. 

“They look like Torao´s tattoos!” their captain noted in amazement.

Zoro furrowed his brows. “Yeah, they do. But why should that lightning throwing earlobe burn the tattoos into the side of a hill?”

Luffy thought for a moment and then grinned, bouncing after finding a satisfying answer. “He has to be a big fan of Torao! I mean, I can understand that. He is a great person after all, shishishi!” 

His crew was not especially convinced. Robin and Nami exchanged knowing looks, silently communicating that they would stand on guard. 

*****

At the same time Enel was torn between being frustrated about how dense some people could be and being frustrated to be called a lightning throwing earlobe. He decided to be frustrated about both, mentally taking note of the fact that he was more frustrated about the first thing through, because his earlobes were glorious.


	7. Law/Luffy 2

**Chapter 7**

The glorious Enel would not be such an outstanding being if he gave up this easily. He had decided on a pair and this time he would not let go. The surgeon and the rubber monkey were a lesser disaster when compared to the surgeon and the angry tulip. He could handle it. And he surely would get them together this time around. His new plan would not fail. He would confront both with the other´s life. Get those two to know each other even better. For this, he let the Automata make a special cake. It had glimpses of his power baked into it and would be served to Straw Hat, so he could not resist his powers just because he was immune to lightning, since he clearly was not immune to food.

*****

Luffy ran over the Sunny´s deck towards a coo he had seen flying over the ship, coming closer to the railing. His crew was currently in the kitchen, preparing food under Sanji´s guidance, but not wanting Luffy around so they would still have food to prepare. The coo landed, a parcel held by a string in its beak. Luffy´s grin stretched to both ears as he received the object from the coo and sent the bird off again. He smelled food and hastily unwrapped the parcel, which greeted him with at a small piece of paper saying “I baked you a cake, Luffy”. It was signed with “Sanji", so Luffy just laughed and gulped down the present inside the box with lightning speed, not caring for the fact that the writing on the paper was nothing like the chef’s handwriting and that said cook was on the ship and had no reason to send him a coo. It was food, after all, and food was always good, wasn't it? It was only after he realized that Sanji´s cakes usually did taste way better than the one he just ate that the captain of the Straw Hats shifted into a more suspicious state. He decided to go to the kitchen and ask Sanji himself. He did not even open the door whole before a foot slammed it close again. 

“No entry, captain. You know why,” the blonde´s voice came from the other side. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Luffy pouted. “I just wanted to know why you sent me a coo with cake if you could have just brought it on deck yourself.”

After a few seconds of silence the door swung open. “I did what now? Why the hell should I do that? I have two perfectly fine legs.”

Now Chopper´s ears perked up, sending the little reindeer into doctor-mode. “Please tell me you didn´t eat something you didn´t know where it came from, Luffy.” 

The captain grinned. “Of course I did!” His happy voice stood in a stark contrast to Usopp´s, who screamed “We´ll all die!” in the background. 

Brook, on his part, laughed it off. “No, only you guys would. Since I´m already dead, yohoho.” 

Franky joined the general chaos by shouting “That was suuuperrr dangerous, Luffy-bro!” 

Nami just shook her head in a worried kind of annoyance while Robin calmly suggested “Maybe you should throw up, captain.” 

That idea shut the whole crew up. It seemed sound, if extreme and mildly disgusting. The only one disagreeing was Luffy, of course. 

He bounced on his heels happily. “I refuse. It´d be a waste of food. And it tasted good, even if Sanji´s real cake is way better.” 

With that he ran off, dodging every further argument. 

Enel, in that instant, was glad about a person´s stupidity for once.

*****

The moment he saw the third lightning coming down at him, Law nearly cried out in frustration. When it hit him he felt a familiar sensation, oddly close to his Room, swapping his soul with that of another person. He only recognized it immediately because he tried it out once with Bepo, since he wanted to test out his Devil Fruit power in detail. 

Bepo had been his first choice because of his outstanding loyalty, assuring Law that he would not tell anybody else about their little experiment. Being in the body of a polar bear had been weird, but Bepo had seemed at least as irritated as Law had been himself. Big floppy paws and a man´s bony fingers were very different, after all. The polar bear had been heartwarmingly gentle with Law´s body, not wanting to break his gangly captain by accident. 

What Law had not thought of before conducting his experiment was the hour-long talk ensuing once they swapped back, Bepo lecturing him about his underweight and constant lack of sleep, which the bear had clearly felt himself while in the human´s body. Even if Law had tried to tell him that a polar bear would think of every human being as underweight (given the mink´s own body mass), Bepo would not have been convinced in the least. And rightly so, even if Law would never admit it. But that, and how the entire crew discovered their body swap despite it all in the end, was another story.

For now the captain´s problem was that he was dragged out of his body and towards the one of another captain. He felt that it was Mugiwara-ya with a surety, which meant he knew the body he´d inhabit at least. In the moment at which both of their souls were floating past one another, he managed to contact Luffy. 

“Pretend you´re me,” he said, before he remembered that the other captain, like Law himself, did not like being ordered around, and added an equally uncharacteristic and desperate “please". Sadly, there was no time for Luffy to answer. Or for Law to reconsider whether his instructions were all that good of an idea.

When he got a hold of himself again, he was rested on a bench. He also had crumbs and liquids all over his face. Law blinked to close his eyes against the blinding light shining through the windows into the dining room of the Thousand Sunny. Deductive reasoning told him that the stuff on his face was most likely part of the meal Luffy, without a doubt, had inhaled a moment ago, before passing out. 

Law jolted at the sensation of something cold touching his neck. Cold things on his body were never a good thing, with the exception of surgery tools and weapons in his hands. He turned to the side that had been touched, instinctively on guard. That was when he realized that he was looking into a familiar furry face. The cold thing from seconds ago was a hoof. The Staw Hat doctor´s big black eyes, which were looking into his own intently, reminded him of Bepo´s. Law slowly relaxed, relieved that the touch meant no threat. 

“Are you alright, Luffy?” the reindeer asked in his kind voice. 

Luffy, right. Law was Luffy for the time being. So he should pretend to be the other, too, like he had asked the Straw Hat captain, right? He had asked out of concern, for his crew members who would surely be worried, and out of the wish to live up to his reputation of the Surgeon of Death, at least on the outside. But how would Luffy think about all of this? For now he decided to fake the Gum-Gum user´s behavior, pretending he was the other.

“I'm fine!”, he claimed, trying to flash his best approximation of a grin at Chopper. 

It did not seem to work. The little one seemed more frightened than anything else. Law must have looked creepy. 

“How funny. You look like a murderer, captain,” Nico Robin assessed, calm as usual. 

“Kind of like a maniac grinning at his pray,” the marksman, Usopp, added, sounding way more unnerved than the black haired woman talking before. 

Shit, this could be a problem. Did he really look so creepy? Law was used to wearing his personal brand of `mental wreck` on his face while in his own body, but he had not known that Luffy could even seem frightening without actively trying to do so. Now he was really curious what he looked like while trying to grin. Then, again, he had to deal with another problem first. Said problem being the concerned Straw Hat crew.  
Law let the creepy grin slip, shifting to his own natural expression and imitating Mugiwara-ya’s rarely seen serious face instead. 

“I´m really fine. I guess I´m just tired. I´ll go and take a nap now,” he said, then rose from the bench and moved towards the door. 

Luckily, Law roughly knew his way around from his previous stays on the Thousand Sunny. The crew he left behind, however, looked skeptical for more than one reason. Besides their worries about their leader´s health, they all had noticed untypical details in Luffy´s behavior.

For starters, he would usually recognize his friends immediately after waking up. Him flinching away from Chopper was more than suspicious. Second was that extremely weird smile. It simply looked wrong on their captain´s face, not happy or full of glee at all. The third fact was most likely the most unnerving: Luffy never left any food behind. Still, he had not only ignored the crumbs on his face, but his still filled plate, too. Today´s dish had been one of his favorites- grilled meat and fish. To top it off, he said he was tired. Luffy never was. He would fall asleep on occasion in the middle of jumping around, but he would always outright deny that he was tired at all. The Straw Hats did not need to share a single word to agree over watching their captain closely.

Law had reached the sleeping quarters. He had removed the crumbs on his face with a vest lying around on the floor that seemed to need a wash anyway. Law was currently hovering over a small mirror he had found after searching the lockers lining one wall of the room, for which he had only felt a little uneasy. He needed that mirror badly, after all- for learning to smile like Luffy. He was getting somewhat closer to the original on his fifteenth try, when suddenly the door swung open.

“Hey, captain. We´re having shitty cook´s dessert on deck. You coming?” Zoro asked, arms crossed in front of his chest. 

Law had dropped the mirror in shock when the door opened, but he was still on the floor, most likely looking like a gremlin crouching over his treasure. His answer was all reflex, the same it would have been if the situation had unfold on his submarine. “Can't you at least knock?!” he hissed, which sounded wholly unnatural in Luffy´s voice. 

He could not remember hearing the other captain´s voice sounding like that, ever, and it alerted him to his misstep. He cut off his hissing immediately and changed his facial expression to the one he had just practiced. 

“Sorry, Zoro, you just startled me. No need to ask about dessert!” he grinned, bolting out of the room and towards the deck, just how he imagined Luffy would do.

Zoro lingered in the silence left behind in the room. Something was definitely off. Not only that Luffy, the one who never bothered knocking, just got mad at him for not doing so; he had sat on the floor, with a mirror in front of him. Odd enough, but there was also the dirty vest on the floor. It had crumbs on it. The exact same crumbs which were on his face not long ago. So he never ate them. And he even took the time to answer Zoro properly and apologize to him before dashing off. This was not the Luffy the swordsman knew, that much was sure. Just what in all of the Blues was going on here? Had it something to do with that mysterious cake?

Law tripped on his way towards the deck more than one time. He reminded himself of Cora-san with every faltering step. Always clumsy. Glad that he finally managed to get on the deck of the Thousand Sunny, he was looking for the Straw Hats. They were sitting on the patch of grass covering the deck, underneath the tree with its wide spread branches. Brook was playing a happy song on his violin.

Robin and Nami looked at Law curiously. The sounds of him stumbling his way through the Sunny had most likely been heard by everyone. He moved towards the group in a fast pace, noticing that Zoro had also reached the deck, walking close behind. 

“I heard we´re having dessert!” Law announced, as cheerily as he could muster, placing himself between the other pirates.  
Sanji nodded and brought out some pastries. “Here you go,” he said, smiling and handing one over. 

The Heart Pirate wondered why he was the only one getting one of the small cakes, but decided that Mugiwara-ya would not hesitate in taking it. That, plus he was pretty sure he could trust the Straw Hats, especially since they thought he was their captain. So he grabbed the pastry and took a bite.

He flashed a grin at the cook after finishing the small cake, which was delicious. “Thank you, Sanji!” he exclaimed, and froze.

He heard a sword unsheathing. There was no doubt that the cold thing on his neck was blank steel this time around. 

“That’s it, I´ve had enough!” the swordsman growled. “Not to mention all the other things before, but our captain would never take more than one bite for such a small pastry, and he´d surely notice that it was made by me and not the shitty cook.” Zoro´s voice turned even sharper. “So who the hell are you? And what did you do to our captain?” 

Law gulped. He was thinking hard and had no immediate answer to offer because of it.

“Answer me, now,” the crew´s first mate demanded, angling the blade closer to Law´s neck. 

The surrounding Straw Hats all seemed determined to get him to talk as well. Even so, Law just could not repress his reflex of hissing at people, especially when they threatened and bossed him around.

“You know you´ll only hurt your captain if you cut me, right? It is his body, after all,” he stated coolly, clearly angry but not afraid to give the swordsman a piece of his mind. 

“Fine,” the other said after a moment, using his free hand to grab Law´s hair and tilt his head back while moving his sword away with the other. “Then I guess we´ll just have to beat it out of you. Even if captain will feel a bit uncomfortable about this later, I'm sure he´d rather have his body back than not.”

The glances of the crewmembers were positively hostile now. Law felt that he had screwed up really bad. Time to try and save the situation, since it looked like it could not get any worse. 

“Fine, fine. I´ll talk,” he said, hoping to calm the others, even just a little. “I'm Trafalgar Law. Your ally. Not your enemy,” he added, making sure to announce ‘ally' and ‘not your enemy’ as clearly as possible. 

The Straw Hats gave him confused looks. 

“And why should you steal Luffy´s body if that´s the case?” Zoro wanted to know. 

The Heart Pirate sighed. “I didn´t. Mugiwara-ya should currently be inside my body. All I can do is hope that he won't do anything stupid." Law closed his eyes. “I told him to pretend that he´s me when I felt that the blue lightning initiating a body swap.” 

Zoro´s grip on his hair loosened and he dropped down, sitting beside Law. He came to the same conclusion Robin now voiced: “Blue lightning? You don't say…” 

Usopp continued. “Why should Enel make them swap bodies?” 

That, Law could actually answer. And he also had learned something new. “So, that striped-nosed earlobe is called Enel? It looks like he´s devoted to playing matchmaker recently.”

The Heart captain took a deep breath before telling Shachi´s and Penguin´s story, as well as the story about Eustass (minus compromising details) and the problems it had all caused. The Straw Hats believed him, all hostility gone now that he was speaking honestly. They came to the conclusion that they would most likely have to wait for what would happen, since Enel did not seem to harbor ill intent for whatever reason, and decided to let the Heart captain stay as long as needed. Knowing that it was Law made the intrusion a great deal less bad. The whole crew assumed that the man was no threat for their captain before they made the alliance, so they were fairly certain he wasn´t now. The Straw Hats weren't behaving all too different towards Law than they would towards their own captain. They all just hoped that Luffy was doing okay, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next Chapter will be the last part of the Law/Luffy chapters.  
> Maybe I will write down the story about Law's and Bepo's body swap after finishing this project.  
> Let me know if you would like to read that :)


	8. Law/Luffy 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello and welcome to the next chapter :)  
> This story will get around 3 more chapters, I guess.  
> The next one will not be uploaded at next sunday but in two weeks,  
> since I have a lot to do lately.

**Chapter 8**

Luffy was confused about Law’s request. Why pretend to be someone he was not? Would it not be much more convenient to tell everyone what was going on and have fun with the people around? Silly Torao. The weird feeling of being dragged out of his own body subsided pretty fast. Luffy was surprisingly aware of his situation. Not only did he make a conclusion based on Law´s few words, he could also smell and feel the difference in his surroundings. More than that, however, he could hear the differences. The worried voices surrounding him were not the ones of his crewmates. He still recognized a few of them though.

Before the Straw Hat started to blink he made a decision. He did not know why the other captain wanted to keep the current situation a secret but he seemed to be desperate to keep everything hidden. He even asked, not demanded. So it was, from Luffy´s point of view, necessary to fulfill his fellow captain-alliance-member-friend’s request. He was sure that it would be hard to behave like the grumpy, sarcastic and always worn out surgeon but he would not disappoint Torao! Time to go into action!

He blinked once, attempting to slowly lift his upper body from what seemed to be a bed. With a serious frown, Luffy looked in the direction of three Heart Pirates who surrounded the bed and were still chatting, mild panic in their voices. He listened in on their conversation.

“That never happened before. Never. He was hit by that lightning two times before and he never went down from it. He appears to be alright but something´s odd, I can just…feel it, somehow,“ the man with the penguin hat rambled, looking toward another man with an orca-shaped hat and a polar bear, clearly searching for some kind of helpful remark or assurance at least. 

The white furry one nodded. „I’m not comfortable with the situation either. But you two were knocked out by the lightning too, when it first struck. So we shouldn´t worry too much, I guess?“

The bear looked everything other than happy. His name was Bepo, if Luffy remembered correctly. The previous speaker should be Penguin and the one taking the word now was Shachi.

“Guys… This earlobe guy is really starting to get dangerous. Maybe we should fight him or at least try our best to get intel on him, after captain wakes up.“

With this he looked toward Law´s body and straight into Luffy´s eyes. The latter did his best to suppress his urge to smile widely at the Heart Pirates and tell them about Enel. Instead he just looked at his temporary crewmembers with an air of annoyance.

“What happened after I passed out?“ he demanded to know in a voice so monotone that it sent shivers down Luffy´s spine. It was all for Torao´s sake. He was not allowed to get discovered. 

“Captain!“ three relived voices filled the room at once. Then Bepo started to explain. „We got you to your room immediately after we checked your vitals and you appeared to be alright. You were only out for around ten minutes, but we´re so glad that you´re awake again! Do you feel alright, captain?“

Luffy forced himself to remain level-headed and only nodded his head to show he had taken this rather heartwarming statement to account. 

“Alright. Yes, I’m fine,“ he added after recognizing that the others still expected an answer to the question about his health. However, they made no move to leave his room. „You can go now. I need a moment to myself,“ Luffy said in an annoyed tone in hope to get rid of the spectators whom he would gladly chatter away with on any other given day.

For now though, he was pretty sure that Torao wouldn’t keep them around. He really hoped that his acting was authentic. He was not completely sure if he managed something close enough to the surgeon´s behavior to leave the crew without suspicion.

There was no immediate reaction other than uncertain shifting and Luffy gave them a glare to prove his point of wanting to be alone for the time being. He gave himself an imaginary high five when they nodded slowly and excused themselves. The moment they left the room and the door shut, Luffy flopped backwards on the bed.

So this was Torao´s room? The surgeon had been on the Sunny a few times, but Luffy rarely came to see the interior of the submarine. The few times he was in here it was in the wake of emergencies and the Straw Hat could have sworn that Law just slept inside of his operation room. If he looked around at the sporadic décor, he was still relatively sure that the operation room was the more frequently used out of the two. Maybe he could decorate the captain´s quarters a bit, before Torao returned to his own body. He would surely appreciate the effort. Or not. But seriously? Luffy could not care less. There was no way he would leave this room as empty and plain as it was right now.

But before he would do anything else, there was another thing he needed to do first. He had noticed it the second he had entered the Heart Captain’s body: Hunger. He needed food, as soon as possible. How could the surgeon eat so little? It was a complete mystery to Luffy. And if Luffy was lean, then Law was no less than skinny, if put next to each other. So- Food, immediately. And then sleep, since that appeared to be another thing his alliance member lacked.

Every part of Luffy´s three-step plan sadly had a major problem attached. The rubber boy made a mental list.

1\. Find food. Problem: He may not be seen. It would look unnatural for Torao to walk around suddenly, grabbing food and eating it like a starved animal, as was Luffy´s usual way to go about it.

2\. Get an extended period of sleep, or at least nap for as long as possible. Problem: A sleeping Torao would be suspicious. Maybe Luffy needed to lock himself in here and just hope for no interruptions.

3\. Redesign Torao´s room. Problem: Find materials to do so and drag them into the captain´s quarters unseen. Also, there may be no intrusion, so locking the door was completely necessary and hopefully not suspicious.

Step one, into action. Carefully, Luffy opened the door a tiny bit to spy into the submarine’s main corridor. Good, no one was around. As sneakily as possible, Luffy left the room and smelled the air. He could clearly make out which way he needed to go to get to the kitchen. Ducked low and moving slow, he shuffled in the direction until he reached another closed door. He was pretty sure that he reached his destination and lifted a hand towards the doorknob to take a look inside the room of heavenly smells, when he was suddenly startled by a voice behind him and shot upwards out of his crouching position. 

“Are you trying to sneak your food out, captain? We won’t have that again! You can’t pretend you ate it. We notice if you didn’t, even if you say you did. We all know you throw it overboard sometimes.“

The boy had not heard the polar bear approaching and he surely had not suspected that sneaking around in his own submarine was something the Heart Pirate captain did on occasion. More important was the fact that he was not discovered. At least not in a way that was threatening his plans. Maybe this could turn out to be a strike of luck. Luffy decided to play along while noting mentally to have a good long talk with Torao, since wasting food was something he totally could not forgive. If the surgeon did not want it, then he should give the food to Luffy, instead of the ocean and the Sea Kings under its surface. He thought hard about what the other captain would do in this situation. He decided to go with a sigh. Bepo reacted just like he hoped he would. He took the sound as an affirmation of his own theory.

“I knew it! Well captain, no excuses! Even if the lightning hit you again, you have to eat. Now would be a good time, I guess.“

Perfect! Food in sight! The Straw Hat tried his best not too look too eager to follow and even ate as slowly and reluctantly as possible when the polar bear placed it in front of him. It looked so delicious! He noticed that it was only a small portion, maybe because the surgeon’s crew knew the man never ate much. It annoyed Luffy a great bit. He would have to search for more after clearing this plate. With him at the table sat the big man he faintly recognized back from Sabaody, Jean Bart, and the only woman on the submarine, Ikkaku. Bepo still lingered close to his side as well. Keeping the act up, Luffy shoved the next spoonful of tasty calories in his mouth while planning further ahead.

Should he speak with the others? Would Torao do that? Not likely.

Should he ask them for more food? Would Torao do that? Most likely not.

Should he try to convince them that there was a higher reason for him to keep food in his room and take it with him to eat it in secrecy? Would Torao do that? Definitely not.

He was running out of options here. His safety check for not acting too much like anybody else but the Heart’s captain failed after every single try. Unconsciously, that ended in him doing the exact right thing: Glaring at his food. He seriously looked like the wonderfully tasty stuff had insulted him personally and deserved a death sentence for it.

Jean Bart was the one finally reacting to the display of perfect grumpiness, effectively interrupting Luffy’s train of thought. “You know captain, you could take the food to your room and finish it slowly over the day. But you really need to be sure that you´ll eat it and not throw it away or something like that,“ the man said, a serious look on his face.

Ikkaku decided to add a rather unexpected sentence, for Luffy, that is: “Yeah, the only time you actually ate was as a compromise, when Bepo made you give an oath implying that Cora-san´s soul couldn’t rest in peace otherwise.“

Luffy needed all of his self-control to not gape at those words. That was definitely playing dirty! And from Bepo! He would never have suspected. He got that the polar bear only meant well though. The furry mountain even looked incredibly guilty sitting beside him. Well, if nothing else, this was a great opportunity for him. Let’s get trapped! Luffy faked another sigh.

“Fine, fine. I promise, for the peace of Cora-San’s soul, that I will eat as much food as you give me when I´m back in my room later.“

Sorry, Torao.

Ikkaku yelped happily. “Captain, you know what you just said, right? You´ll eat up everything on your plate and everything else we give to you! And there will be plenty!”

With that she jumped to her feet, running to the back of the kitchen to get more than just the small meal sitting on the table. Jean Bart smirked victoriously, and even Bepo looked incredibly pleased. They all thought he had slipped on his words. Not the truth, but precisely as planned. Luffy put on a show, burying his face in one hand and shaking his head a bit like he regretted saying anything. When Ikkaku came back, he just reached out for the large lunch box she gave him and silently walked back to his- or rather, Law’s- room. He gave the surgeon´s Nakama credit for caring so much. They surely had great crews, both captains.

While wondering how Torao was doing in his body, Luffy inhaled all of the food after making sure the door was locked and no one could witness this very uncharacteristic spectacle. It was still less food than Luffy would eat on a normal day, but the rubber boy could imagine that it was way more than his friend would eat in three. After finishing everything and annihilating even the slightest crumbs he fell back on the bed with a loud thud and closed his eyes. Time to move to step two of the plan.

“How long do you think he can hold up the charade?“ Law asked no one in particular while bent over a map together with the Straw Hat´s navigator, the others lingering close to them on the Thousand Sunny’s deck.

He and Nami had decided on a course to meet with the Heart Pirates as soon as possible a few hours ago and were checking their progress now.

“Less than five minutes,“ the swordsman sad while lying on the deck with his eyes closed.

“I say 30 minutes,“ the little reindeer doctor raised his voice while playing cards with the marksman who added, “I give him twenty.“

At this Nami stood and started collecting money from her fellow crew members. Law raised an eyebrow, at which she grinned sweetly. “Bets,“ was her short but effective explanation. It sure was not what the surgeon had intended to kick into gear, but oh well…

“I bet that he won’t be discovered early,“ he said dryly. “Otherwise, I´ll may have a serious problem on my hands, so I really, really wish- more than actually bet- that he won’t be discovered. At least not from someone outside my crew. If it’s only my crew, I’m not that screwed,“ he explained after seeing the surprised looks on the Straw Hat’s faces. He also gestured to Nami that he would add his Beri to the stack later since Luffy’s short´s pockets held none.

Robin joined the game as well. “I have to give it to captain, he´ll surely be determined not to give himself away after receiving the request from Torao-kun, but this is still our captain we´re talking about. So I will bet on two hours.“

“Yohoho! That´s a good point, Robin-san. But I will still give him only one hour,“ Brook spoke up.

His bet was followed by Sanji´s: “15 minutes. Then he sees food somewhere and it’s over.“

Franky nodded in agreement. “Anything interesting will do to distract him, so I´ll bet on ten minutes.“   
Finally Nami put her own Beri to the stack. “I say forty minutes.“

With this the only thing left to do was wait. They should arrive at the submarine’s location soon. Law hoped that nothing went wrong, and that the body swap would reverse after meeting his own body.

The sun was just about to set when they finally spotted the submarine emerging from the sea. Usopp let down a rope ladder to allow the Heart Pirates to come aboard the Sunny. They did, and Law, or at least his body, stood in front the Heart crew, a typical frown displayed on his face. Law, in Luffy´s body, blinked, bit irritated, not even trying to grin like the Straw Hat would, since he would only risk looking outright creepy.   
The two crews stood facing each other in silence until Luffy (in Law´s voice) began to speak. “Hello, Mugiwara-ya. Is there some reason we´re meeting here today or was crossing paths just a coincidence?“  
Law gaped- he literally gaped- at his own behavior. Not really his own, but Luffy´s in his own body. Yeah, sure, that was something he would say, but… Hearing himself do so from the point of view of an outsider and knowing it was Mugiwara-ya, not him, he was seriously confused. It was only their two crews gathered here and they all seemed unharmed, so there was no need to hide anything any longer, was there?  
“I guess we can drop the act? “ he suggested carefully, closely observing the other´s face. 

The Straw Hats watched with amusement. All the while, the Heart Pirates seemed a little stiff and caught by surprise regarding this unusual reply. Their looks changed to complete shock when their captain started grinning and bounced off towards the other group of pirates, chirping a wholly out-of-character „Yeah, sure! “at the Straw Hat captain before hugging everyone his arms came across. 

Nami smiled slightly and huffed a sigh while looking at the other pirates. “Guess you won the bet, then,“ she said before reluctantly handing Luffy´s body a stack of Beri.

To stop the irritation of the surgeon’s crew from skyrocketing, Robin spoke. “You see, that man named Enel threw lightning at Torao-kun and tricked our captain, so they would swap bodies. Meaning you weren´t with your captain the whole time, but with ours. And the other way around.“

They all looked pretty shocked at this revelation. So they really never guessed. Then Shachi´s gaze landed on Luffy´s body. He went a few steps closer towards him. ”So you´re captain, captain?“ he hesitantly asked, at which Law nodded. “Ah, weird. Then-“ Shachi stopped, looking over to the other Hearts. “Guys, group hug!“

“Oh, no-“ Law started but was quickly interrupted by Penguins “Oh, yes!“ before being dragged into a hug. Even the Straw Hats joined them. The moment Law felt Luffy’s arm (his own, in actuality) wrap around his shoulders (Luffy´s shoulders), he also felt the odd motion of his soul lifting from Luffy´s body and stepping slightly to the left, into his own. Relief filled him immediately. It had worked out as he hoped.

“Yay, I’m back!“ Luffy announced happily, continuing his bouncing on his own two feet. 

Both crews on the Sunny were pleased at that outcome. They had their captains back.

“So, what does the tattoo look like?“ Shachi asked his captain, searching his tan skin expectantly, right along with Penguin.

“Yeah, we got this little heart over the guy´s thumb after we got together. What´s yours like?“

The Straw Hats were very interested in the conversation all of a sudden as well, listening in the untypical silence. Law pushed his sleeve up. There was indeed a little heart over the little striped-nosed man´s thumb. He raised an eyebrow at it.

“Really now, earlobe? You call that a successful matchmaking?” Then he shrugged. “Well, whatever. Mugiwara-ya did what I asked him to and I’m sure that was a hard thing for him to do. Unlike with Eustass, I´m able to accept this.“

The two crews grinned knowingly at the Heart’s captain. Only Luffy didn’t seem to get it at all.

“Cool, we have matching tattoos!” he observed, oblivious and chipper as ever. “Aaaand… I’m pretty sure you just admitted you like me!“

Ok, so maybe he was not completely oblivious.

“I like you too, Torao! That´s why I ate and slept a lot while in your body! I even decorated your room a bit since it seemed so plain. I found paint in your submarine´s storage room and drew my Jolly Roger on one of your walls!“ Luffy said and proudly put his hands on his hips. 

Law blinked at him once, twice, then pinched the bridge of his nose. “I take everything back. Give me Eustass again, earlobe-guy.“


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to the newest chapter!  
> After writing this, I came to the conclusion that one more chapter will be enough to get to the planned ending.  
> So the total number of chapters for this story will be ten, which makes this one the second last.  
> Hope you enjoy!

**Chapter 9**

They met at Thriller Bark. To be frank, it was quite a long journey for many of them and they had to backtrack their routes on occasion to get to its actual position, but the always present mist cloaking this place made the perfect point for their secret meeting. It would surely be causing a societal uproar if the fact got out to the public that marines, pirates and even the revolutionaries were cooperating for once. One could ask why they were doing so but surely no one would understand their reasoning if they were not involved yet. ‘Yet’ was the key word here, since Enel seemed eager to involve everyone at this point…

*****

\- Two weeks prior -

Enel regarded the scene below, quite pleased with his supreme self. His latest project was a success, yet again. He only got better at playing the messenger of true love.

‘Great going!’, he congratulated himself with a healthy amount of satisfaction, ‘Great going!’

Now, what could the glorious one do for his people this time around? The first few happy couples had been hit by the lightning-arrow of fate, his merchandise was on its way to being delivered by Automata and Coos, and everything looked so very promising. Time, then, to bring the matchmaking to a larger scale!

He studied the sprawling relationship-map on his wall with a squint. At this point, he could not read it very well, since it was overloaded with colorful lines and little pictures. Was that line going from rubber-boy and fire-brat´s brother connected to the one named Koala or the one named Dragon? The latter, it looked like. The gray-haired Marine's picture was in line with… That man? Woman?- Whatever- with the big head? And the boy with light pink hair had a line connecting him to that pirate lady with the big iron club. Was that a heart or crossed swords above the line? 

Well, it would work out either way. Under his godly guidance everyone would be able to find true love. Even if he was reading the map incorrectly, unlikely as it was in his infinite and awesome wisdom, there was this game called ‘enemies to lovers’, no? Everything would work out according to his great doodled-on plan. He would first bring these two together, and then those two, and them, and them and maybe these two, just because he could…

*****

\- Thriller Bark, present time –

“…And when we found out where the stupid lightning had come from, people got mad. Dragon’s eyes spelled bloody murder and I had to convince Koala that I´m not in any way in a relationship with him. For four hours,” the head of staff of the revolutionary army, Sabo, added his story to the pool of unbelievably dumb attempts to couple completely non-compatible partners.

Koala, sitting beside him, nodded along. “Yep. To top it off, it´s not even secret that Sabo and I have been together since last month. Shouldn’t that Enel-dude do proper research and not bother already happy couples?”

“Yeah,” Captain Coby agreed eagerly, much to the surprise of many of the other participants of the meeting. “Long story,” he brushed it off, face flushing red.

At the other end of the long table that they had built out of barrels and planks, Alvida shrugged. The logic behind Enel´s doing was not any clearer to her than anybody else gathered around the room. Undefined noise could be heard from outside when a breeze brushed past a window. The sound elicited a reaction from Vice Admiral Garp.

“This place is kind of spooky. I´d love training the new recruits here! I can just imagine them, jittering and cowering in fear! Ha, that would be a sight to see,” he grinned widely at the prospect, while Ivankov’s big head shook no.

“That would be pretty mean, honey. How about you take them to train with us sometime?” He gave a suggestive wink to drive the point home.

Garp froze and coughed, definitely in hope of not looking caught off-guard. “Maybe, someday,” he replied swiftly, changing the topic immediately. “So. This earlobe-brat did a load of dumbass shit. We´ve gathered here to plan for countermeasures; still we only heard whiny stories so far. Rather than crying about spilled milk, we should try to save the rest of the jug. Any plans?”

Kid immediately spoke up. “We could beat his ass! Then the problem-”

“Great plan, idiot,” he was cut short by Law. “You know how to get to the moon and back in one piece?”

At that Eustass grumbled and clenched his fist. So he did not think this over properly. 

The greatest achievement of the meeting so far was that they had been able to figure out Enel´s exact position, thanks to one of White Beard’s children who had eaten a Devil Fruit which allowed them to talk to Coos. And oh boy, those birds were talkative. A few of them had brought every single attendee of their little gathering some of Enel´s merchandise, made on the moon. Ironically, they were all crowded together now, working on a plan to put a stop to the ridiculous matchmaking and wearing Enel-themed shirts and caps while doing so. The stuff was just so very comfortable and incredibly high in quality. The mugs were especially appreciated; many had those filled with coffee in front of them. Though none would ever admit they liked them.

Among those currently sitting around the table were all the successfully coupled Enel-pairs, their close friends and crews, as well as the ones who weren’t lucky enough to get a reasonable partner but were still hit by lightning two weeks ago. Those of the last variety included: Sabo, Koala, Garp, Ivankov, Coby, Alvida and a few low ranking Marines and members of the pirate crews that had the (mis)pleasure with the blue lightning before. There were so many effected people hailing from Whitebeard´s, due to the sheer size of it, that the man himself had decided to tag along with his children, not bothering to listen to any concerns about his health. Only Dragon had not shown up, clearly relying on Sabo and Koala to solve this mess.

Said woman raised her voice now. “Maybe we can negotiate with him. He´s annoying as all get-out and I hate his guts for the stupid things he did but maybe, just maybe, killing him would be a bit harsh?” she reasoned.

“That may be worth overthinking,” Mihawk announced. “He at least seemed to have good intentions, in the beginning.”

“And his doing isn´t completely useless. I mean, at least a few couples were matched, even if the methods were screwed up,” Nami added, before thinking for a moment, devilish smile on her face. “Vivi and I surely would´ve been fine, just not as rushed as we were now to get out from under the lightning-throwing radar. But I´m not sure these two idiots would´ve ever gotten together otherwise.”

She sent a pointed look towards a snoring Zoro and a torn Sanji right beside him. The cook looked as if he couldn´t decide between huffing and agreeing, since Nami-swan did have a point. Mihawk and Zeff only traded knowing looks, mentally screaming ‘we knew it first!’.

“Might be, but we´re getting off-topic. Back to it, before this is going out of hand again, yoi.”, Marco sighed, clearly determined to get this whole thing over with. He honestly had enough to do back on the Moby, an interference like this would not help in decreasing the stacks of paper on his desk. He took the word again. “We were about to discuss negotiation. I, personally, am pretty sure it won't work. Trafalgar’s ‘negotiation’-”, he announced the word with a flatness that clearly showed he neither approve of or counted it as an actual means of ‘negotiation’, “was only effective after he resigned to hurting himself, after all, yoi", the phoenix fruit user stated matter-of-factly.

At this the surgeon´s entire crew nodded and hissed in agreement. They were not very happy with the prospect of negotiation after remembering the particular scene they stumbled into on the submarine. 

Law dissipated their anger, reminding them of another incident. “He got me to eat and sleep for a day, too. Even if it was technically Luffy-ya doing so.”

The murderous aura subsided in literal seconds, but the problem that had gotten this roomful of unlikely allies together still had to be resolved.

“So," Penguin began, “if neither fighting nor negotiation is an option, how about we beat him with his own weapons?”

The room fell silent. 

“You mean… turn the game around and match him with someone, for a change?” Coby asked.

After a collective moment of contemplation Whitebeard´s voice echoed from the walls. “Seems sound. But who do we couple him with so he doesn't bother other people? Or rather: Who are we willing to banish to the moon?”

“Akainu!” came the immediate response from Ace, Sabo and Luffy all at once. Nearly everyone around the table toppled over with laughter.

“Nice!” Shachi giggled, almost unheard over the sound of Whitebeard´s loud vibrating laughter. 

Garp grinned as well, but shook his head nevertheless. “I for one- and this better never leave this place- would not mind him going missing on the moon. Hell, I´d be eager to help in getting rid of the red pest! It´s just that I´m close to certain that if either of them would manage to come back to earth again, he´d do so alone. One of them would be dead within a day, or less. And that would be Enel, most likely. So we´d botch the non-killing.” 

Ace shrugged. “At least Akainu´d be gone, hopefully forever. I´d be the tiniest bit sorry for Enel, but… collateral damage, I guess. It's not like he´s particularly innocent or anything.”

Whitebeard smiled at his son, unsure if the boy really meant what he´d said. “Still not optimal. But what do you think of the following idea? For Akainu we´ll work out something in addition to our basic plan. Enel, we could couple with…”


	10. The great final

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone,  
> thanks a lot for all of your motivating comments and the input on what you liked most!  
> It helped me a lot while deciding how to write this last chapter. Also thank you for all the kudos!  
> My special gratitude goes again to calicomako for beta reading and ideas to improve the story.  
> Now I hope that you all will enjoy the great final. Beware the supreme Enel, god of matchmaking-misadventures!

**The great final**

The supreme ruler reclined in his throne once again, lazily gazing down upon the Blue Sea. That was when his incredibly sharp eyes spotted something unexpected. It had irked him when he was not able to follow many of those puny human´s movements once they had drawn close to the moving island named Thriller Bark. They made no move to leave said island in the following days. Now, however, a fleet of mismatched ships emerged from the surrounding mist.

Enel looked closer. The main sails had been messed with, something drawn on each of them. Oh, no, wait. Not drawn, but written. In bold letters, the fleet below spelled out: PLEASE, O GREAT ENEL, SUPREME RULER OF ALL! BESTOW YOUR DIVINE BLESSING ON OUR FELLOW HUMAN, AKAINU, AND GRANT HIM A DEEP MENTAL CONNECTION TO A VERY PACIFISTIC INDIVIDUAL. HEARING SUCH THOUGHTS ONE-SIDEDLY WILL SURELY OPEN HIS EYES TO YOUR SHINING GREATNESS. PRAISE TO YOU!

Well, that was one precise request- or, he corrected himself, he might even see it as prayer- directed at him. Certainly he had no obligation to fulfill their lowly wishes, but they had finally been enlightened to his infallible wisdom, it seemed. They had even addressed him properly. Enel almost felt a modicum of proudness towards those little runts. In his benevolence he decided to forego the pondering over whether or not to grant their little request and rather to see to its fulfillment, instead.

After a few hours of internal self-praise while feasting on a well-deserved banquet, Enel focused on the task at hand once more. So, who was the most pacifistic worm he knew of? His gaze flew across his relationship map and then, finding no satisfactory answers on it, continued to brush over his throne room. Some Automata steadily worked here and there. His eyes came to rest on one particular worker.

That one underling never caused any problems. It was quite diligent, shy and peaceful; had not gotten into a fight even once. Moreover, it was here on the moon with his shining self. So that Akainu person, who seemed to be very rough and bristly most of the time, would pose no danger to this new soulmate. It was decided then. Enel sent down a spear of lightning, waiting for it to strike true and the effects to kick in.

*****

Not much later Garp witnessed how a flash of blue knocked Akainu, who had been occupied with training, clean out. The older man had arrived at the Marine base nearest to the current position of Thriller Bark only one hour earlier. He honestly had not expected that earlobe guy to act this fast. 

He pondered the thought of looking after the other Marine for a while, before deciding on leaving him to the shocked newbies gathering around. Garp had other things to do. Namely, inform all the other parties who were in on the plan about this (seemingly positive) result. They would need to wait for a while before they could move on to step two. Hopefully everything would go right and an end could be put to the chaos that had spread ever since the first of earlobe´s victims had been chosen.

Three days passed quietly after lightning had struck Akainu. In that time span no one was eager to approach the man. He obviously was not all right. Looking like he had a terrible headache all the time, he avoided any form of contact and glared daggers at everyone who dared to speak to him. 

“Exactly like we anticipated,“ Garp thought and grinned brightly, scaring a few recruits who crossed his way in the halls in the process. 

It might look creepy when a high ranking Marine walked through the corridors of the station, grinning to himself like a madman. The man could not care less. He was headed towards the office that had been given to him upon his arrival to make sure step two of the grand plan was set into motion in the following days.

*****

The great Enel watched and listened with furrowed brows as the grey-haired man spoke to someone on the other end of the snail’s line. The one he was calling should be the rubber pest, if he concluded correctly. Which he did, of course.

“So what I’m telling you is that the ol´ red dog only got worse. I´m completely sure that the supreme one’s lightning didn’t work for some reason. Maybe the great Enel isn’t as superior as we thought,“ he told the pirate.

This conclusion was absolutely wrong, naturally. Everything went according to plan. The only possible scenario could be that the “red dog” continuously refused to accept the mental connection which had been bestowed upon him and was acting more aggressively than usual because of his own misunderstanding of the situation. Maybe he thought that someone tried to manipulate him or- worse, but not entirely unfounded- harm him. The Automata only produced positive mental images, though. Enel personally made sure of it. 

He had taught the Automata, with a great deal of self-restraint to keep from laughing at the idea of it, the benefits of peace and negotiation; how violence was a bad thing and not to be carried out under any circumstances. Naturally he had let them sing his praise after every sentence of his throughout that lecture, lest they forget his unmatched supremacy. Be it as it may, Enel just could not accept to lose his new devotees so shortly after gaining them. Or ever, for that matter. 

“Better act quick,” he told himself.

If the first lightning strike was not able to change the Marine’s attitude, the ruler of Fairy Vearth only needed to throw a stronger one his way. The mental connection was not enough? Fine, then he would pull something new out of his sleeve- a technique he had just perfected earlier. He would test his new enhanced lightning, which should be able to make people fall for each other immediately, on the stubborn hotheaded dog.

*****

Garp stood close to Akainu, who was out and training yet again. He was only one arm´s length away, ready to jump into action the moment blue lightning was seen anywhere but far enough to not bother his unlikable colleague. 

The plan they had all cooked up in the mists of Thriller Bark went as follows: Akainu was to be coupled with a full-blooded pacifist, by their humble request. They then had to pretend Enel´s endeavors did not bear any fruit, regardless of the actual outcome. Once the “supreme ruler” decided to make absolutely sure things went his way with a second round of lightning, they would throw back that electric charge at Enel, who then would also be linked to the very pacifist that he had intended to couple Akainu with. 

Their only concerns and sympathies were directed at the unknown pacifist, who would have to handle both Akainu and Enel if they succeeded. Therefore, they asked Enel to make the connection one-sided. The pacifist would never be bothered by either of their unlucky matches and it was highly unlikely for Enel, who knew the person’s identity, to be able to come back down to earth to harm them. Sure, there was a risk that Enel could cancel the effects of the deflected lightning, but after contacting Viper all the way up in the White Sea, the schemers of the anti-chaos plan were mostly convinced that stripe-nose shouldn’t be able to undo the powers of his own Devil Fruit on himself.

What they did not consider, though, was the possibility of the pacifist being on Enel´s side. BY his side, even. Because who would think the moon had a population of more than one self-proclaimed god and his bloated ego? Even less did they expect the man to use a different kind of lightning for his second attempt at changing Akainu's lifestyle. 

Unaware of these deviations from the assumptions they had built their plan around, Garp sprang into action when the sky lit up. He jumped in front of Akainu and held up a shield-sized mirror the moment he saw the lightning fall. He had hidden the object under his coat up until then, so it would not raise any suspicions. The lightning crashed into the reflecting surface. Garp made sure to angle it precisely so it would be sent back to the same point it had come in from. The beam crackled on the mirror´s face and zipped back into the sky.

Mission accomplished.

*****

Enel barely had the time to register what had happened, eyes wide in surprise and disbelief, before he was struck by his very own lightning. It rattled his teeth and buzzed down his earlobes, leaving him light headed. The supreme forced his body to right itself in order to collect himself. He dismissed the worried Automata starting towards him with a wave of his hand. Even in his state he had to admire its perfection. The shape of his nails, so well taken care of and- oh, had his fingers always been this beautiful? 

Looking into the glass of a nearby mirror, which he kept in every room of his residence to gaze upon his handsome self whenever he pleased, the supreme one gasped. What an incredible piece of art was staring back at him?! He had never been one to deny his own handsomeness, was well aware of his regal build and poise. But those earlobes! Those defined features! Those broad shoulders! Those abdominal muscles! (one, two… seven, eight-) The exquisite choice of clothing! All of it was just so undeniably alluring. He simply was an especially amazing sight to behold today, wasn’t he?

Slowly he stepped closer to the mirror, remembering that the foolish humans had him furrow those delicately curved eyebrows not too long ago. By his earlobes, he would never do that again. He could not risk a frown to grace his wonderful visage, after all. He would not let so much of a hairline of a wrinkle form in his smooth glowing skin. Though, reconsidering, no wrinkle could diminish his appearance, since it would be HIS wrinkle. Ergo, it would be an outstanding part of his outstanding self. Still, he was not willing to risk it. 

The humans would surely be able to handle themselves from now on. He would bathe in beauty products in the meantime. He was not in need of them to enhance his looks, as was evident by the smirking reflection he beheld, but they would do no harm. Plus using them felt so refreshingly good, and if any living being deserved to feel as good as godly possible after all the good they had rained onto the world, it had to be him.

His mind was made up, so he lifted the remaining effects of his match-lightning from the worms down on the Blues. The only exception being that Akainu, who stayed connected to his assigned peace-loving Automata, since someone’s heartfelt request had led to their connection. The great Enel would not waste any more energy on humans than that. He needed all of his own attention right now. He needed to admire himself more, much more, for he was the most beautiful, outstanding and handsome being in the entirety of all existence. Oh, how he loved himself.

The Automata watched their ruler, not finding his behavior to be too different from his usual day-to-day. They were mostly ignored by their supreme ruler, and only got orders every now and then, which they dutifully carried out to the best of their abilities. After one Automata asked what should be done with the remaining merchandise, his Excellency demanded it to be used to decorate his home, since the designs were born from his genius golden mind and should therefore only grace the eyes of his holiest of selves and those of his underlings, who would otherwise live in eternal darkness. 

With the memo reaching the head of the merchandise department, the Automata made its way to the Coos they had used to carry their wares into the world to tell them what had happened. It sent them back to the Blues with an apology, since it felt bad for those who would no longer be able to gaze upon the Great Ones likeness.

Weeks later, the news about what had transpired on the moon reached White Beard’s crew, and with that all the other parties they had schemed with, by the wings of one of those Coos. No one could bring themselves to worry about any of it. Quite the contrary: Most were highly amused, breaking into song and dance on each ship, island, or base all around the Blues once the matter was resolved for good. Over the clinking of beer glasses and the stomping of feet, jubilations rung out over the seas:

“Bye-bye, earlobe-guy!”

“Thanks for nothing!”

“Here´s to never seeing your stupid striped nose again!”


End file.
